In the beginning

This blog is to document my adventure in attempting to obtain employment in the entertainment industry. Mostly this is an attempt to keep me motivated and not just accept the status quo anymore.

A little about me, I have a degree in theatre arts management, with a strong background in technical theatre. Immediately after completing my course work I got hired at a large theme park, initially I was hired as a ride operator, but soon I was brought onboard as an entertainment tech and within weeks I was promoted to a supervisor position.

I worked there for 2 years, most of my job took place in the summer but there was a little bit of work to be done year round. I spent the rest of my time taking some classes at the local community college, and working as a lifeguard and swimming instructor at the local YMCA.

In the fall following my 2nd year at the theme park, I moved about 4 hours away to be closer to my family. I quickly found a job at the local YMCA and took an EMT course and ended up getting involved with EMS for a couple of years.

I found myself longing to get back into the theatre scene and did some community theatre work before finding some regional theatre gigs.

I once again moved, this time out of state to return to school. I worked on a lot of school productions, and had an awesome job as Technical Director of the student run theatre. I got to oversee the use of the theatre and teach and supervise students. I designed a few sets and got the chance to do the lighting design for a lot of the shows.

I got the opportunity to work at one of the biggest most influential musical theatres in the United States for a summer. It was great; I oversaw the intern program and got to work both in stage management and company management.

I eventually moved back close to my family, when I couldn’t find any theatre work I took a job at the hospital in the ER doing a lot of the same things I had done while working on the ambulance. After about a year I was itching to get another theatre job.

I started looking online for jobs and applied to a job at the local professional theatre and was offered a stage management position but it didn’t start for a few months. I then was able to land a summer stock position working backstage and supervising the theatre rigging, something that I didn’t have a lot of experience with (but boy do I now).

When I returned from summer stock I started my stage management and was having a blast until I injured my back while working. Next thing I new I was being told that due to budget issues my position was being cut.

So back into the world or EMS I have gone, and this is where I am now.

I recently have begun looking for a theatre job and employment on a cruise ship.I have learned very quickly that finding a job on a cruise ship is really difficult. There are all sorts of websites that claim to have the golden ticket of sorts on how to get hired, but of course they all want you to pay them for this information….something that I am just not willing to do at this point. I found a couple of email addresses etc and have sent off my resume, but I doubt I will ever hear from those attempts.

One of the guys I used to work with is currently working for Royal Caribbean; I asked him how he got his job. He said he had gone through an agency and gave me the contact information to the person who had helped him. He told me to tell the agent that he recommended me.

I was very hesitant to contact a recruiting agent, so I initially did not email him. About a week later the guy who I used to work with asked me why I had not contacted the recruiting agent yet. So after being teased about it I finally sent a quick email to the recruiting agent. I never thought I would hear from him.

After I sent the agent the initial email I got a response within a few minutes asking for my resume. I sent him a very brief resume, just where I had worked and what my job descriptions were. The next day I got yet another email asking for specifics on what equipment I had worked with. This is not really information that I had readily available, I am not really an equipment person…I am the type that if I already am familiar with the light board..Great if not I read up on it but don’t keep track that I am using brand XYZ running ABC version 4 etc. But apparently this is the information that they wanted, so I called around to places I had worked at obtained the information and sent it to the recruiting agent. I got a response saying…great I will send this to the cruise line and will contact you if I hear back from them.

Again I thought, well I will never hear from them. About a week later I got an email saying that the cruise line was interested in me and the recruiting agent would be scheduling an initial interview with me.

The next week I had the initial interview via Skype, it was very basic just about cruise life not anything about the job. At the end of the interview the recruiting agent said that I did really well and that he will be scheduling me an interview with someone from the actual cruise line, and that it will be more job specific. He told me that if I have any questions to contact him and that I will receive an email when he gets the interview scheduled.

And this is where I stand now.

I have only applied to 2 cruise lines, and I am debating whether I should wait this opportunity out or continue to apply to other places.